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Eric Holder to justify targeted killing

A national security speech Attorney General Eric Holder is set to deliver Monday will to contain the Obama Administration's most-detailed justification yet for drone attacks and other operations aimed at killing Al Qaeda operatives outside of war zones, a source familiar with Holder's remarks said.

Holder's address, due for delivery Monday afternoon at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, has been long awaited by legal academics and civil libertarians eager to hear the legal underpinning for strikes like the one that killed American citizen and alleged Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula leader Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen last September.

The administration is facing at least three Freedom of Information Act lawsuits over its refusal to release the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel memorandum that reportedly provided a legal basis for the targeting of al-Awlaki. Officials say the memo is classified on national security grounds, as are the drone operations themselves.

The administration has apparently decided to maintain to the veneer of secrecy surrounding the operation. Holder is not expected to reference al-Awlaki's killing directly, the source said.

Much of the concern and debate about al-Awlaki's killing has focused on the fact that he was a U.S. citizen, born in New Mexico in 1971, who's life was taken by the U.S. Government with no public legal process. However, some human rights activists and international law experts contend the issue is less al-Awlaki's citizenship but rather the use of deadly force outside a combat zone.

In a speech a couple of weeks before al-Awlaki's killing, Deputy National Security Adviser John Brennan indicated that the Obama administration doesn't subscribe to the notion that force can only be used in declared combat zones. He also suggested the U.S. has a more elastic view of what constitutes an imminent threat than do some U.S. allies.

Holder's remarks will also include a discussion of the Obama administration's use of military commissions and civilian federal courts, along with how officials decide which cases are best suited for each venue, an official said.